SENIOR members of a tenants' and resident's association are threatening to resign as they feel they are 'banging their heads against a brick wall' with Rochdale Council.

Dennis Wilkinson - Waithlands Tenants' and Residents' Association chairman - and the organisation's secretary Ian McLean say they have had nothing from Rochdale Council since the association was formed four months ago.

Dennis said they had asked for street lighting columns to be repaired, skips to be put on the roads and house boilers to be replaced. They wanted steps removed from Kingsway Bridge in case drunks congregated there and stronger fencing in case a car came off the road and landed on the estate. He said the council had ignored their requests and gone against the edicts of its tenants' participation charter.

The final straw came this week when bushes that have been on Waithlands Road for more than 50 years were torn up against tenants' wishes.

Dennis said: "Ian and I feel like resigning because we're just not prepared to waste any more of our time. The council's tenants' participation charter says its work on estates will be governed by tenants' wishes but it is completely ignoring that.

"People are blaming us for the bushes being removed and we've told them it's not our fault. We asked council officers about trimming them because they were dangerously tall, but we didn't want them pulled down because they act as a barrier to traffic noise from Kingsway. The next thing we knew they were being taken up."

Ian said: "We have monthly meetings with council officers where we talk about problems on the estate, but we never seem to get anywhere. People ask us what we've achieved and we can't keep telling them we've had all these meetings if nothing is happening on the estate."

Joan Marsh, of Waithlands Road, said she hoped Dennis and Ian wouldn't resign as the estate needed an association. She added: "The bushes should never have been cut down as we had sparrows, wrens and hedgehogs in there and now we've lost those. One little girl was crying when she saw what had happened. Ian and Dennis have worked very hard for this estate, but they don't feel they are getting anywhere."

A Rochdale Council spokesman said: "The Tenant Participation Unit exists to help residents' groups get things done in their areas. We're making efforts to get in touch with the association to make progress with their concerns."

Jill Dixon - from Rochdale Boroughwide Housing - said workers had that rather than trying to trim the bushes back they would remove them altogether and put new shrubs in their place. Steve Tombs - Rochdale Council Technical Services director - said his department was monitoring the siuation with the steps.